


The Bright Spots of My Mind

by Mindswander



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Eventual Smut, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mild Blood, mild violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-23
Updated: 2014-01-25
Packaged: 2018-01-05 17:32:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,624
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1096612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mindswander/pseuds/Mindswander
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everything around you crumbles when you don't know if the man you love is alive or dead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the wonderful stormchasersteve! I hope you enjoy it!

There is an element of frustration at being forced to fight like this. Hand to hand combat, though preferable with his teammates, is proving tedious with these beings. For every one he manages to destroy another takes its place and it’s not long before Thor realizes he’s in trouble just as he suspected he might be.

Earlier, at the beginning of the battle Tony had dubbed the entities they were fighting as resembling something he called a Praying Mantis. They sat on bent hind legs, had sharp extended claws for hands protruding before their bodies and their misshaped elongated heads held mouths with rows of shark like teeth. Perhaps in another situation the Mantis’ would not prove so troublesome but there are civilians everywhere. In the buildings around him alone Thor can hear the screams of the scared and vulnerable, and though eager to protect them, he is limited by their presence. He cannot use his Mjolnir to her full capabilities and as the bodies pile up and more file in he’s starting to feel overwhelmed.

_After the Captain had called out their directions the others were quick to scurry off but Thor hesitated. He had never one doubted the other’s calls before but today Thor’s own sense pushed back against the order. Even so he took off for the center radius he was meant to cover as the others drew them inward. As he flew however Thor reached out to the Captain. “Captain, are you positive you wish for me to protect this section of the city? I could perhaps be used better elsewhere,” he started cautiously._

_There was a moment of silence and then the Captain’s voice sounded in his ear. “Positive Thor. Afraid you can’t handle it?” Steven had jested and Thor could hear the smile in his voice though he had no visual to confirm it._

_“No,” Thor had laughed and landed in the square, breaking the concrete on impact._

And he could handle it under normal circumstances. But in this scenario his own training as a strategist had told him this would be a poor showing for him, had heard his own father in his head at the suggestion, but Steven had surprised him before so he had gone along anyway. But mistakes are made and Thor is dealing with it. There is a small child behind the window plate glass window nearby, he is certain, and the need to protect outweighs his own sense of self preservation as he fights on though the odds are swiftly turning from his favor with this technique.

“I am in need of assistance,” he growls and rips the arm straight out of the socket from the one beast, twirling it in his hand before using it to cut its head from its body. Dropping the foul thing Mjolnir circles back around into his hand, having taken out a small bunch crowing around him. Behind him, there’s a small sound, hardly anything above the din of the battle around him but it catches his attention. Fingers on glass, his mind registers and Thor turns to it to see a shock of white blond hair, above terrified yet curious green eyes; it’s a small boy peering from the darkness to watch him.

Thor snaps back into the battle as the small boy gestures at him, pointing a shaking finger, but by then it’s too late as Thor grunts when claws pierce his back. His legs immediately give out and when he looks down the edges of the claws are protruding from his chest, glittering in the light and coated in his blood. He only registers the pain of it when teeth clamp over his shoulder and bite through the armor to sink into the hard flesh below.  Thor tries to scream, the hurt white hot with agony, but it only comes out as a strangled gurgle with the copper taste of blood filling his mouth and spilling over his lips. _Run_ , he thinks at the boy, and distantly registers more teeth sinking into him as the world goes shiny and falls away.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "And maybe this ain't what you came to see but I'm broken hearted"
> 
> That's the moral of the story with this chapter folks.

10 heartbeats and Steve was a failure once again.

_Ten. Nine._

Steve heard the call for help and had rounded the corner when…

_Eight. Seven. Six._

“Captain.” The Director’s voice and Steve is no mind reader but the levity is unmistakable. Steve falters in his running.

 _Five. Four. Three_.

Tony arcs over the buildings to his left, swearing things that he would never dare repeat, but it doesn’t matter because…

_Two._

_One._

The sky bursts into a shimmer, clouds swirling, and then it comes, the rainbow Steve had become so used to shooting down from the sky.

Thor was gone.

* * *

 

Maybe at some point Steve will remember the rest of the battle and ending up at Headquarters, but if he never did he wouldn’t complain.

The tight skin of his cheeks says enough.

They go over and over what had happened but Steve doesn’t have an answer. He’s dizzy and nauseous, hands shaking and trying to hide it, but only then does he realize he can see. Standing, the solider stalks over to Clint and takes the techpad from his hands (the archer doesn’t say a word), swiping back few files and over, clicking to the video from today.

The walls were swarming with the creatures and Thor was fine, mostly, but then something catches his eye and the blood. So much blood. How could anyone survive that?

“Was he, is he—“ He stammered, throat and mind blocking him from speaking the words.

“I don’t know,” he answers, but his tone sounds like time of death.

* * *

 

Hours later Natasha pries the pad from his fingers, daring him to resist with a flash of her eyes, and Steve releases without question, fingers aching and heart heavy. He couldn’t have survived that.  He couldn’t and he had failed again and in the worst of ways. Thor is (he won’t say was until they tell us. They’ll tell us? Maybe not.) his best friend, his lover, his everything and also beaten, broken, bloody. Steve is the cause of both.

* * *

 

Though his heart was in pieces Steve hadn’t cried since the battle of the mantis’. There were other missions, silly things that Steve almost didn’t think warranted their help but they all went without question. It shortened his days at least. He was left tired and empty rather than burnt from the inside out and vibrating with tension. It was something to look forward to.

It was dinner time and the avengers were huddled around the table.

Tonight Tony was in rare form. He, and the others, hadn't bothered to disguise their drinking, but Steve was beyond reproach, just scooting a pea across his plate. With a flick of his fork it rolled onto the table and Steve couldn’t be bothered to chase it. Even if he were to eat, which he wasn’t right then, food was bland and tasteless.

“Could you snap out of it for five seconds?” Tony lounged back in his chair, half slumped sideways with cup of liquor in his hand.

“I’m sorry?” Steve’s eyes flickered up from his plate of useless food with a grimace on his face.

“If you can’t give us Steve at least pretend to be Captain America.” There was a snarl behind his words that made Steve’s jaw clench but he said nothing, instead taking a long draw of water from his glass.

“That’s exactly what I thought,” Tony snorted and clinked his teeth against the rim of his glass before draining the tumblr in one long gulp. He looked strnagely smug as if Steve had validated all his thoughts about him and they certainly must not have been bright at the moment.

Steve huffed and gave Tony a blank stare. “What is your problem?”

“Get ahold of yourself, you can’t be—“

Steve scoffed, incredulous. “Thor might be….dead and you—“

“Tony…” Bruce’s tone was low with warning as if he knew exactly how his mind worked.

“Sitting around here feeling sorry for yourself. Just admit that it was your fault and move past it.” Tony finished speaking, but the tension lingered in the air. Steve wasn’t even sure he was breathing.

It was his fault, he knew that, and yet hearing it so blatantly from Tony, knowing it must be on all of their minds brought the shaking back to his hands. Staring down at them, horrified with himself, Steve stood suddenly. The chair scraping with a screech over the floor was asking to an explosion in the silent room.

“Christ, Tony,” Bruce cursed quietly. “Steve…”

The solider would answer except he had to bow his head from the burning in his eyes and the lump in his throat. He shouldn’t let them see but he was an old tree, roots grown deep and immoveable.

Lost in the struggle to control himself, Steve almost jumped at the touch to his arm. “I’m drunk, drunk enough to say I didn’t mean it.” Sincerety could be twisted from those words, bled dry and filled a cup made of regret.

The whole thing was outrageous. And Steve would laugh except that it would probably come out sounding like a sob, tears threatening to spill over from where they welled in his eyes.  Maybe Tony didn’t mean it or perhaps the others didn’t think it, but the weight of the knowledge crushed him every day. Nightmares of rainbows, Thor’s armor and blood haunted his nights; exhaustion and guilt haunting his days. It had been six cycles of the sun and the solider was going out of his mind.

“When are they going to tell us?” he croaked and finally, the dam broke bringing a hot flood of tears with it. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Though you may want to jump down my throat I am not trying to paint Tony as the bad guy here. Everyone deals with grief differently and I think perhaps some lingering childhood issues are here...(cough) haha <3
> 
> Rping has taken over my life so I'm eternally sorry for being so slow.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry! Actually really sorry that I left it like that but I find if I write it in smaller segments I'll write faster so yay?


End file.
